Drunkblogging Obama’s Oval Office Address
4:52PM One of the things I usually love about CNN’s web feed is, they give you the raw stuff — including before the President even shows up. That’s not possible when he’s speaking from behind the Resolute desk. And you can insert your own Irresolute joke here.
4:52PM Spill estimates are now up in the range of 35,000-60,000 barrels a day. Note that the bottom end is where the top end was just a couple days ago. Which is how I’m going to feel by the time this address is over.
4:56PM This is a test of the emergency drunkblog system. It is only a test.
4:58PM For reasons unknown even to me, I can’t help thinking these days of Groucho’s seven-cent nickel.
5:00PM I’ve gone from Grey Goose to Absolut Citron on ice. No way I’m wasting more of the good stuff on this guy.
5:01PM While we wait, the best we can do is hope and pray the President convenes a panel of experts. And panel of ass-kicking experts.
5:03PM Yes, he’s comparing the leak to the Terror War and the Great Recession.
5:03PM A team of best scientists and engineers with awards! We’re saved!
5:04PM Wait… strike that last comment. He didn’t cite any credentials for ass-kicking.
5:04PM We’d better nuke the site from orbit. It’s the only way to be sure.
5:04PM Shorter Obama: “Hurricanes are easy. Leaks are hard.”
5:05PM Battle plan! Is it an ass-kicking battle plan?
5:05PM 30,000 personnel in four states. Tons of ships. 17,000 Guardsmen.
5:05PM Correction: Ass-kicking personnel.
5:06PM Hey, where’d the boom come from? I know a guy who knows a guy who can get more of that stuff.
5:07PM Speed? Day 57, buddy. I’ve also heard that Gov. Jindal STILL doesn’t have permission to build the sea wall he just ordered built.
5:07PM Just once, I’d like him to keep one whole finger on the desk.
5:07PM One ass-kicking finger.
5:08PM Tomorrow Obama will meet with the CEO of BP. That’s Day 58, if you’re keeping score at home.
But to be fair, setting up a third-party to handle compensation payments is quite sensible. sss-kickingly sensible.
5:09PM The Secretary of the Navy is going to develop a plan. With a panel, and perhaps even a commission.
5:10PM Mr. President? When are those rigs coming back? The ones you drove away with the moratorium? The moratorium that went deeper than the scientists recommended?
5:10PM And an Understanding Commission!
5:11PM OK, so the Commission must do its work thoroughly. But will you be taking off for spelling?
5:11PM I will lose hours of sleep and suffer nightsweats over the image of “corporations pleasing themselves.”
5:12PM We’ve learned lessons! Ass-kicking lessons.
5:12PM Here it comes — the push for cap & trade.
5:13PM They’re drilling a mile beneath the ocean because ANWR is closed and so are the shorelines. (The “you lying bastard” clause at the end is implied.)
5:13PM Countries like China are building coal-fired plants every week. Green coal!
5:14PM Now is the moment! Of a mission! An ass-kicking mission!
5:14PM Do a shot if he mentions Spain.
5:15PM Millions of jobs! By accelerating and seizing! By which he means, he’ll accelerate the seizure of private wealth to keep Al Gore rich.
5:15PM Al Gore: “I’m trying to watch the speech.” Laurie David: “Oh, put down the remote and get in bed, big boy.”
5:16PM He won’t accept inaction! It’s not too big or too difficult to tax! Er, beat.
5:17PM Faith will power your car! Uh… you get out and push.
5:18PM The words are lofty, but — as always with this guy — let’s wait until we see the legislation. Oh, and just this once, I’d like my Congressman to see it before he has to vote on it. Pretty please?
5:19PM Well that was mercifully free of content.
5:20PM Seriously, I feel so unsatisfied.
5:20PM There wasn’t even enough meat to make proper fun of. Proper ass-kicking fun.
5:21PM I keep waiting for somebody else to come on TV, maybe a cabinet member, to read the real speech, the one that tells us… I dunno… stuff.
5:23PM Seriously, sorority girls have done the Walk of Shame home from frat parties feeling more satisfied.
5:24PM You just want to say, “I spent a quarter century conditioning my liver for this?”
1200 troops to Arizona to sit behind desks. 17,000 to the Gulf to do what?
Yup. 1200 troops that WON’T be working in the area that is closed to US citizens, south of I-8 between Casa Grande and Gila Bend. You know, the part of Arizona that the US government has effectively ceded back to Mexico…
http://www.resistnet.com/forum/topic/show?id=2600775%3ATopic%3A2275423&xgs=1&xg_source=msg_share_topic
“Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” BHO will be following this scripture from his gospel of Alinski very close during his lecture tonight – count on it !
Other shorter Obama: Designate the sacrifice, pound the table, and demand all their money. Straight Chicago-style “community activism.”
yeah!!..and the spill will be 90% stopped in ….get ready….
WEEKS!!!! WEEKS!!! whoopee!!!!
’til then we die. If the second well misses..it will be 90% in a couple of years. It’s embarrassing to listen to him, so we don’t.
Obama, America’s paper tiger.
Heard about the BP Atlantis?
“community activism” is such a long phrase to type. Let me help you shorten it: communism. Better, no?
BHO needs an enemy – because:
“An organizer must stir up dissatisfaction and discontent… when those prominent in the status quo turn and label you an ‘agitator’ they are completely correct, for that is, in one word, your function—to agitate to the point of conflict.” ~ Saul Alinsky
The Enemy – BP, Big Oil, CEO’s, Freedom, Liberty, Capitalism, etc.
The Answer – “non existant and mythical “green jobs” that, like BHO, ride unicorns, lower the seal levels and heal the planet…
Instead of a moratorium on drilling, how about a moritorium on bubble mortgage interest. Have the entire interest payment applied to principal for a year, and make it tax deductible. Bank cashflows don’t change, except they don’t show a profit and can’t justify giant bonuses. Their balance sheets improve, homeowner balance sheets improve, and people are less likely to walk away (from paying 50% higher than market rates on inflated debts).
The decrease in tax revenues will be offeset by value restored to toxic assets the goverment holds, since many of them were designed with the assumption of prepayment.
Banks, and bank shareholders need to be punished because people took out mortgages that they can’t pay back?
How big is your bubble mortgage?
Mine’s not bad.
Not really a punishment. Cashflows are unaffected to banks and incentive to pay is increased. It’s mostly a trade of short term profits for long-term security/stability.
Potentially, banks could lose out if realestate suddenly shot back above bubble levels.
Giving up a years worth of interest, which after all is what the rest of us call income, is supposed to make banks healthier??? Are you totally insane?
After a year, those who can’t make payments now, still won’t be able to make payments, you’ve just guarenteed that they loose less when they finally do default, at the expense of the banks.
It’s not “given up”, it’s just not recorded income. The banks take in the same amount of cash, and they keep it when the owner inevitably defaults. The big problem is that the plan would give false hope to a lot of those bad mortgages and cause them to continue making payments when the rational thing to do is walk away.
The bank only loses at sale, the amount above principal the house sells for up to the amount of that year’s scheduled interest, or at the end of the mortgage (the mortgage would either be payed off early, if the payment is unchanged, or payment could be reduced at some point). Of course, this is far in the future and the loss would need to be discounted at inflation, making it very small.
If anything, it should improve share value.
I love it when those who know nothing about economics and finance try do design solutions that make everyone else pay for their mistakes.
SO NOW HE DECIDES IT’S TIME TO ACT LIKE HE GIVES A DAMN ABOUT PRAYER AND APPEALING TO GOD???????????????????????????? EXCUSE ME WHILE I BARF. I WONDER IF HE HAD TO CHOKE TO AVOID SAYING ‘ALLAH’.
So wait, is he irreligious or a Muslim? Pick one and stick with it.
It is possible, of course, to be simultaneously both a Muslim and irreligious.
Wait a moment…has anyone ever seen Obama eat something the imams have declared haram? After the statements of Egypt’s Foreign Minister a few days ago, we need a bit more confirmation. Someone must offer Obama a pork chop!
There’s a difference?
Since we had to actually put up with him gridlocking 50 miles of beach road between Mobile Bay and freakin’ Pensacola last night at 5 p.m. ~ yes, that’s right.
NO ONE COULD GET HOME AT RUSH HOUR IN TWO STATES ~ and then have him tie everything up from Pensacola to Pensacola Beach for THREE FREAKING HOURS TODAY ~ I’m going to watch “Deadliest Catch” tonight right after I finish reading Steve’s transcription of the non-event. Far more entertaining and informative.
I’m sick of him.
But, for the record, he took and oath as President to defend these shores from ALL enemies foreign and domestic.
He has failed miserably.
..well, Sister, I am doing something even more deliriously gay [old meaning of the word] out her in SoCal: I am cleaning out my toilets and my septic tank.
THS,
I am not the least bit surprised to hear that President Self Centered and his hapless handlers didn’t bother to consider the impact of his security on workers commutes. I wonder how many moms and dads had day care schedules disrupted for his manufactured show of concern?
I stopped watching President Feckless speak last fall. I can’t put up with the lack of content and the nauseating socialism and anti capitalism that pervades his hectoring lectures. I know I will be peppered with outtakes from it for the next several days.
The fact is that he made a complete hash of his administrative and executive duty to keep petroleum off the beach while evading responsibility. He has had his hands on the wheel now for 18 months, the blame Bush routine has turned off the public. The people on the Gulf coast now think Bush did a better job with Kartrina.
Only 2 1/2 more years. Elections have consequences.
Now, please know, I am no fan of President Obama… voted for McCain, for W twice, huge social and political conservative.
But, let’s not rag on BO for the traffic congestion resulting from his travel plans, and security detail. If he were NOT down there, he would be criticized by a gaggle of Conservatives for NOT showing his support… for being out of touch… for ignoring the situation.
There are too many things emanating from this man and his administration that merit true criticism, (this speech, for example) that we don’t need to embellish otherwise innocent events.
Keep taking the fight to the Libs.
Note: one reason that President Bush took so long to visit on the ground after hurricane Katrina is that he didn’t want to tie up the place with security! He deliberately decided that the cops had better things to do.
In NO, the cops were indeed busy rescuing people.
In the Gulf, the cops are not involved in the clean-up.
I want to see a Islamic “blessing of the fleet,” especially since some scholars consider oyster, clams, shrimp, and lobsters to be unlawful to eat.
Aw shuck, gosh gee willy, I missed it. But as I’m supposed to avoid alcohol until tomorrow, perhaps it’s for the best.
Well that sure beats Carter’s malaise high water mark.
19 minutes? He really doesn’t have a plan, does he?
Yeah, he’s the man with the plan! Check it out!
“The Smartest Guys in the Room Tomorrow Will be BP
By Chris Horner, American Spectator
So President Obama is meeting in the White House tomorrow with BP’s chairman. The focus of public discussion of this event has been on it taking until the 57th day or so since the Deepwater Horizon rig caught fire following a well explosion, precipitating the ongoing oil leak.
The more relevant figure is 4,700. If my quick calculation has it right, that’s the number of days since the last time a BP CEO was in the Oval Office.
On that day, August 4, 1997, then-CEO, (then-Sir) John Browne, joined by Ken Lay, met in the Oval with President Clinton and Vice President Gore.
Their mission that day? As revealed in the August 1, 1997 Lay briefing memo which I was later provided—having left a brief dance with Enron after raising questions about this very issue—it was to demand that the White House ignore unanimous Senate instruction pursuant to Art. II, Sec. 2 of the Constitution (“advice”, of “advice and consent” fame), and to go to Kyoto and agree to the “global warming” treaty.
Oh, and to enact a cap-and-trade scheme.”
As they say, never let a good crisis go to waste. No sense stopping the gusher too soon, hey?
I am watching the President with my new and old lovers, Laurie David and of course, Planet Earth. I watch President Obama thinking, not bad, if only I had my chance, but still not bad.
Many make the mistake that this is Larry David’s ex wife. No, no, no. That is Cheryl Hines, who is an actress on Curb Your Enthusiasm. Cheryl Hines is nothing like Laurie David.
You may not know this but the character Susie Greene in Curb Your Enthusiasm was based on my lover, Laurie David.
done well in time for the nba finals.
Meanwhile the other half of this dynamic brain trust was at the DCCC issues conference at the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium here in DC.
The best quote from gaff a minute Obiden?
How about this one: VPOTUS praised House Dems for their “gumption and courage,” making “votes that are quite frankly hard to explain” to a nation of more than 300 million.
Makes me feel so stupid that I just can’t grasp the wonderful things they are trying to do for (or is that TO?) us.
How about you?
tree huggin sister…..I take your comment….”But, for the record, he took and oath as President….” at face value, but personally~~
I.will.never.believe.he.”took the oath”…..he.SAID.the.oath. There’s a monstrous difference.
“Taking the oath” means “without mental reservation”. I absolutely do NOT believe that he ever intended to “defend the United States” from ANY enemies. Absolutely NOT.
“5:00PM I’ve gone from Grey Goose to Absolut Citron on ice. No way I’m wasting more of the good stuff on this guy.”
..I dunno, Steven, based on your premise, I should think that one would be down to straining gasoline through a loaf of French bread or decanting Sterno into a tumbler to achieve the desired effect and economy.
He’s good at the ABCs. Assess, Blame, and Criticize.
I think I’m developing Obama Derangement Syndrome. I don’t like his wagging finger, and supercilious manner.
I think we must look at the cup half full. Given this guy’s record, it was a very short speech. The biggest gifts are the littlest thinngs.
Ah, dude. Not a mention about natural gas vehicles. You wanna move away from oil and you mention solar and wind? Hell, you smiled bigtime on weatherization as it that’s gonna get the kids to school.
Here’s the prepared text of Obama’s speech. Key phrase: “From the very beginning of this crisis, the federal government has been in charge of the largest environmental cleanup effort in our nation’s history.” (Instapundit)
Shows how absolutely impotent the Fed is.
I couldn’t (and didn’t watch) – the promise of all that ass-kicking was just too much for me….or something.
Reminds me of the lyrics to a song from an old Broadway play, My Fair Lady: “Oozing charm from every pore, he OILED his way around the floor. . . .”
this speech will change everything immediately and forever. thank you so much. we can put the commissions into the hole. OK, now let’s go back to the grey goose.
In Laurie David’s defense, she thought she was saving a whale.
After seeing him go through all the stages of grief and several stages of political wriggling, I didn’t care to hear what he’s proposing now. I don’t know that anything he does or doesn’t do will make a scintilla’s difference.
If he wanted to convince us that big government works, he should have spent more time making it do so and less time proposing still more solutions. He has never had the slightest idea of what an executive is or does. And it’s clear now, as he thrashes around trying to figure out what people expect, that he doesn’t have a clue about what a leader does either.
I think that what he finally decided is that, since he can’t fix this, he at least won’t let a good crisis go to waste.
were soros and axelrod really thinking that a speech about carbon taxes & commissions would lift obama in the polls!??!
sheesh.
i think obama has just thrown his presidency under a bus.
OK, I didn’t watch either. But did he come up on stage, take off his coat and roll up his sleeves, loosen his tie? I’m so sick of this shtick, it makes me gag. Then his inflection when he speaks is more than I can stomach. They criticize Sarah, but he is the one that sounds like a street organizer/brawler.
Interesting link there. Take a moment if you will, folks, to imagine how Sarah would handle this crisis. With her background, and contacts in the oil business, any doubt that she would’ve had this handled some time ago? She’d be the perfect person in the WH for the job in this situation.
But, wait, she’s just a snowbilly.
I missed it. No wait, I guess I didn’t. I see he was his usual ass-kicking self.
‘OK, so the Commission must do its work thoroughly. But will you be taking off for spelling?’ Won’t matter. They’ll be too busy watching porn.
‘you get out and push.’ I might as well walk. At 5’4′ and 110 pounds I probably can’t even push a Mini Cooper.
Skipped the whole thing, since I knew I could read about it online anyway, and because I can’t stand the sound of his voice anymore.
Put me in the; “Ditto”, column here. I can no longer stand the sound of this liar’s voice.
Fair to good speech, but he should have said more acknowledging the difficulties of getting a massive clean-up organized, before assuring us that it would get done. It was clear that Palin was not going to have anything good to say about the speech, but what the hell WAS she saying? You can’t trust the oil companies…so…you should be doing what? It’s a lot easier to check a rusty pipeline, than what is happening a mile or more under the water.
Krauthammer had the most reasonable point about not really expecting that the government was going to be able to start things perfectly, any more than we started WWII perfectly. The will and ability to win in the long haul is what counts. It would also be nice if we ould stop the damned leak, because until we do, every day is still a step backwards. We cannot clean as much in one day as comes out in one day, so we may not yet be at the end of the beginning. Obama is not Churchill, so he did not say that, but it was just all right.
Obama could read from the DC phone book and you would be out front praising him for his eloquence.
I went hunting for the sneakiest spin in the speec. See below, in which he attributes credit to his Administration and then pivots to a dangerous prediction about capturing 90% (where he get that? BP?)
“As a result of these efforts, we have directed BP to mobilize additional equipment and technology. In the coming days and weeks, these efforts should capture up to 90% of the oil leaking out of the well. This is until the company finishes drilling a relief well later in the summer that is expected to stop the leak completely.
What is it with Barry and the number 57? 57 states, 57 days… what is it? The Obama Code…
it’s a Kenyan thang…
From the live blogging to the comment section, the anticipation, the zeal were gone. Somebody should check out those usual suspects (DU, Kos, HuffPo) to see their reactions.
From what I saw, the relatively few number of comments (could be due to the shortness of the speech) may be because Americans have already made up their minds about Obama, and more specifically his mis-handling of the oil leak.
Unless the president can produce results, more of his PR stunts will no longer cut it. Not even in some of the left’s circle.
Just remember. These Nobel Prize winning physicists (always announced) who didn’t under the concept of why oil was still leaking from the cap when it was lowered into place, are the same type of government bureaucrats who plan on managing health care “more efficiently.”
Gubmint managed health care will make the federal clean up of the Gulf look like D-Day planned operations.
Don’t take your eyes off that fiasco come the first Wednesday in November. If we’re lucky, after throwing a wrench in the Chicago machine, we can somehow have Obama frogmarched to curb before 2012.
I missed the speech because I knew it would just be more cowbell. I wonder when (if ever) these people will figure out that the Won’s silvery words no longer matter. They didn’t move the numbers on health care or the stimulus (yes he got them both passed, but that was brute force politics, not persuasion), what makes them think it will move them on this crap? Someone has to tell the wizard that the little doggie has pulled back the curtain and exposed the great and powerful Oz for what he is.
Reminds me of the old days when Richard Nixon was prez. I never once watched or listened to that SOB run his yap. This punk Obama is even less worthy of my attention.
Throw his presidency under the bus? Nah, he’s just hangin’ with the home boys til something better comes along. Just a payday and another one line entry on the old resume.
Obama will probably end up in charge of NATO…or a Swedish think tank
i worry more about a citizenry that would elect such a person to represent them, than the person they elected.
Humorous cartoon at http://drawfortruth.wordpress.com/category/media-bias/ showing how the MSM is still in the tank . . . I mean the “ball pit” for Obama.
I guess I missed it. What did he say about an ‘exit strategy?’
I could only watch a few minutes. Where does he get off unilaterally appropriating assets owned by BP stockholders? Maybe they’ll volunteer to compensate affected parties to avoid a lawsuit. Maybe the US government can fine BP. But I’ve never heard of a President saying that he personally can force a corporation to pony up cash just because he says so.
Nalco will Make Money, Monsanto will make money, The Blackstone group ( owns Nalco Holdings which manufactures Corexit, the Chemical dispersant being used in Gulf which is highly toxic and used in amounts of up to one million gallons) are making money.
An Automatic regulator that should have been in place to prevent this tragedy was removed from the 2005 energy bill by the MMS, this could have all been prevented by a single half million dollar item.
BP is on the hook, emails and internal company memos depict safety circumvention in favor of deadlines, in addition engineers knew the well was trouble and asked for added safety precautions which were ignored by management.
President Obama’s admin is on the hook, when taking responsibility, fix it quickly or get out of the way. Crisis management is not something the US govt is good at; Katrina, Gulf Oil Spill, Tennessee floods, etc. What exactly do we have agencies like FEMA in place for..?
The people of the gulf coast are in the worst way; immediate economic impact, but when hurricane season hits the Oil will be spread hundreds of miles inland to agriculture and crops, and there is no way to determine health risk as cancer or birth defects, etc. The only saving grace is Gulf crude is lighter and evaporates somewhat faster than most crude.
Its funny how the same people screaming for less government are all of a sudden screaming for more government when corporations fail to perform their duties.
Most of the people in the industry say such a regulator would have done no good.
What makes you think more regulations could have prevented this disaster?
Do you still believe that more govt is the answer to every problem?
MarkTheGreat,
The Regulator in question is a physical piece of equipment used to control the flow of a Gas or liquid. However, I don’t think it would have helped, because a Blowout takes everything with it when it erupts. It would have just blown the pieces of the Regulator through the top of the Rig, and, killed a few more people.
Typical lefty stupidity.
Why do you think they were so far out in the Gulf they’re drilling a mile down? Because the government won’t let them drill any close to the coastline; nor will they open up ANWR or any other resource on Federal land. Why? Because it would be bad for the environment.
Yep, that worked out real well.
Not to mention the underwater territory in the Gulf is still Federal, the drilling operation was already regulated by the Feds, and for the last year & a half (if you’ve been following the stories) the regulating commission has been in bed with the people they’re suppose to be supervising.
Then there’s the Federal idiots who are babbling about environmental impact statements for efforts to ameliorate the spill, including Governor Jindal’s sand berms. Technically he’s breaking the law by starting them now.
Finally there’s the fatuity of a eighty-year-old law which prohibits non-US-crewed or owned ships from operating in territorial waters. Instead of (I dunno) suspending the fracking law, they’re wasting time transferring the equipment to US ships, instead of letting the Dutch craft in immediately.
We want the government to get the Hell out of the way.
But let’s not pick in Barry while he uses this as yet another excuse to rape private companies, further damage our economy, and enlarge the Federal leviathan.
“There’s a BP oil well leaking in the Gulf.”
“Is it bad?”
“Naah, don’t think so.”
“Tell you what, let’s wait a while, then we’ll have a real crisis…”
“And who wants to waste a crisis, right?”
“Right”
Ass-kickingly hilarious.
Obama’s speech was shocking in what he DIDN’T SAY! No real solutions at all, and now, invoking the name of God. Of course, that is to convince the great unwashed and all the people going broke, that number one, he is a true Believer, and two, if the leak doesn’t stop, he can blame YOU-KNOW-WHO! Have to admit he is so ridiculous he is funny, except for the fact that his administration and his lack of leadership hurt this country every day.
I really don’t remember him using the apellation, God, all I heard was “We need to pray” for this, and, pray for that, but, I don’t think he named his god. Matter of fact, when he started that ‘pray’ spiel, I was listening to see if he would name his god.
May the Lord rebuke President Obama and free our nation from his deceit and corruption. May the American people turn from their sin and turn to the Lord. And may we once again be “one nation, under God, with freedom and justice for all.”
Mr. Green, I understand your love of potato juice and the idea that making oneself blotto might actually help one enjoy this President’s speeches; but as you discovered, there ain’t that much vodka…
When I watched Obama speaking, it sounded like a vuvuzela that would not stop! Even on mute!
So; We are at war with Mother Nature? AAAAAHAAAHAAAAHAAAAAAA!
Obama should have stayed at the cocktail party an out of the Oval Office. It is better that people think you are a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt.
I had to leave the room in the first 5 minutes… couldn’t stand the frantic flailing of Obummer’s hands.
But i got a good enough idea from your blog Steve.
Thanks for not making me — Wait… you spoon feed weekly blogs to us, you spoon feed Sunday talk shows, and you spoon feed us Big-O’s lies. All so we don’t have to put forth the effort to entertain, educate, or think up snarky comments for ourselves…Would that count as a kind of “nanny culture”?
Steve, are you really a liberal in disguise?
Let me recommend Belvedere. It’s time to get serious.
Interesting to note, BP stock fell to it’s all time low this morning following BHO’s speech. Isn’t this guy doing great things for our economy?
The speech I made it through; it was the Celtics game that finally proved unbearable. It was not a great speech, but when it has been, your responses have been about the same. I was waiting for him to call home all the troops from abroad and put them to work fighting the oil spill; now THAT would be leadership. Just imagine how that would have gone over.
Was he serious enough about it? No. Are you guys serious enough about it? No. Am I? Well, right this second I am more concerned about Kendrick Perkins’ knee, but after the seventh game I will be ready to send McChrystal down to scope out the gushing wellhead and, when he is sufficiently hydrated, figure out a strategy.
In the mean time, as I pointed out yesterday, the smell in the whole Gulf Coast is getting worse and worse.
Obama already has his exit strategy in place; pass a massive healthcare bill, ride out the rest of his term, and live in luxury off his healthcare patrons.
I’ve noticed a rising tide of complaints about the smell of the Oil on beaches, and, there is an explanation for that smell: tiny biological organisms that were discovered in the North Sea when they began to pump Sea water into the Oil Pool, and, suddenly the sweetest crude in the world went Sour.
This tiny organism is an “Extremophile” found in every Sea and Ocean (can also be found in onshore wells) that eats Oil and excretes Hyrdogen Sulfide Gas (H2S, or, Sour Gas), the deadliest gas known in concentrations above 5 parts per billion.
It is this “Rotten Egg Smell” that people have been reporting.
I thought the difference between sweet and sour crude was the concentration of sulfer.
How does a microbe introduce sulfur where it wasn’t before?
Hydrogen sulfide is dangerous because when it comes in contact with water, it converts to H2SO4, sulfuric acid.
I’ve been working in, and, building Oil Facilities all over the world for 40 years…believe me, I know what Sour Gas (H2S) is. I’ve taught the safety classes on it, and, had more than one run-in with it.
However the little microbes convert Oil to H2S, isn’t really the problem, North Sea Crude has plenty of Sulfer in it to combine in whatever way, such that when they excrete it, the Crude is sour, and, has plenty of Sour Gas rising from it.
In Aruba, our safety man cleared the #1 Power House for entry. I sent my men into the Basement to pull some parts that we needed in the #2 Power House we were rebuilding, and, went to get some lifting equipment to make the job easier. When I returned about an hour later, I started down the stairs and ran into a wall of “Rotten Eggs” odor. I rushed down the stairs, and, they were all working diligently, unable to smell the Gas, and, I started yelling and shoving them up the stairs. By the time I made it out of the Basement, they were laying all over the ground throwing up, had blinding Headaches, and, a Safety Man got his ticket home.
Addendum,
Sour Gas is especially dangerous because you can “get used to it,” which only means that it has killed or nullified the Olfactory Nerves and Taste Buds. And, as the concentration builds up, you reach a point where you take a step and just drop dead…instantly.
Which is all just silly fearmongering on your part. Hydrogen sulfide produced by organisms processing crude oil is not in and of itself the significant danger in this oil spill.